We’ve talked about the dangers of chemicals on the blog before, but most of those blogs are about burn or skin irritation injuries. However, those aren’t the only ways chemical exposure in the workplace can cause injuries.
According to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, exposure to certain chemicals can negatively affect hearing and balance ability. Researchers say ototixicant-containing chemicals can harm the hearing and balance of exposed workers.
Ototoxicants and Hearing
The OSHA research shows that these harmful chemical components can damage the auditory nuclei and nerves of the central nervous system. This impacts your brain’s ability to receive clear impulses about the sounds you’re hearing. This can lead to hearing loss in many different ways:
- Frequency Resolution – It becomes much harder to distinguish between similar sounding noises.
- Noise Detection – Sounds will have to be louder for you to hear and understand the message.
- Speech Discrimination Dysfunction – It becomes harder to distinguish voices from background noises.
- Sound Distortion – Even at louder levels, certain sounds may be distorted.
- Origin Recognition – It may become harder to determine from where a sound was emitted.
The Dangers Of Hearing Loss
Individuals who work in manufacturing plants or other production facilities may be exposed to these ototoxicants, and they have enough workplace dangers to watch for without compensating for hearing difficulties. If you suspect that your hearing loss has been brought on by chemical exposure or excessive noise exposure on the job over the years, you owe it to yourself to reach out to a Minnesota workers’ compensation firm.
At Hey Workers, we have a system for helping to determine if your hearing loss may be caused by work factors. First, we’ll start out by reviewing your medical assessment by a physician. If you haven’t had your hearing loss professionally documented, we can set you up with a physician who is trained in hearing loss. Once we review your medical evaluation, we’ll go over all of your on the job risks, including chemical exposure, noise pollution or anything else that may have contributed to your hearing loss.
From there, we go to work writing a claim that clearly shows that your hearing loss was at least partially caused by your work conditions. You have to deal with that hearing loss for the rest of your life, and workers’ compensation can help offset some of those costs or pay for hearing aids. Don’t just assume your hearing loss is part of the aging process, speak to a Minnesota injury firm about your options today.
